i have found that perspective is a visual awareness which can be
taught...my fifth graders do a one point perspective assignment and
usually two-thirds get the concept and almost half master the idea.
Some of them get real creative and do things besides their names. They
might do a room in the house, or an outside scene, one even did an
outside work with a bird's eye view. using rulers is a challenge and
have found that my fifth graders can't make a simple one inch grid! I
plan on incorporating ruler assignments from first grade on.
aaron

>From: "paplinda <paplinda@yahoo.com>" <paplinda@yahoo.com>
> I had wondered this same thing about perspective when I began
> teaching elementary art a few years ago. The district's lesson
books
> I had (Spectra, a curriculum written by Kaye Alexander and edited by
> Lee Hanson) provided for a one pt. vanishing point perspective for
> 5th grade.
***********************
I find this thread about perspective in 5th grade interesting as I
remember
being taught 1-pt. in 5th grade in a private school (connected to a
college)
in NC in the late 50's. It must have been the "in" thing in the late
50's-60's for 5th grade and STILL seems to be, it seems. I also
remember
being one of the few who grasped the concept too so that doesn't seem
to
have changed either. I never had art classes in middle or high school
so my
next experience with 3-D drawing was in college.

What really stands out in my memory was being in college and being
required
to draw our artroom or dorm room in 2-pt. including the furniture and
all
the odds and ends. As I love spatial drawing, I was in heaven. No so
for
several of my buddies. They struggled with this and got little or no
help
from the professor. It seemed to me that she kinda dropped the project
when
she saw the problems. Memory is hazy on that account but I do remember
marveling that a college art perspective lesson was so much of a
challenge
to several ART students.

Nowadays I still see the struggle with my 7th-8th graders...even
something
as simple as names in 1-point. With my personal history and
experience,I
feel it's not that kids aren't using their thinking skills to their
fullest
as the fact that for some reason the spatial concepts are primarily
difficult for them to comprehend. Smart kids are some of my less
perspective-thinking kids. Some of my less-than-smart kids get it
right
away..which blows away the theory that it's a "thinking" skill
primarily.
Sure...there are rules to perspective but you have to know when it
makes
"sense" to use the rule. I would even go so far in this flappin' of my
lips
to suggest that it's a "sensory" skill instead of a "thinking" skill.
I
would say it's more of a "feel, sense, know" than a "think".
Sooooooo...it
troubles me (no...irritates me) when someone says that students aren't
using
their "thinking skills" if they can't connect to perspective. There's
much
more to the reasons behind it.

It's a wonderment each time I teach perspective to see just which
students
will master it and who won't. I'm always amazed at the outcome because
I can
never picked them out beforehand. Interesting topic. Toodles....Bunki